Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE Encore is a Japanese role-playing game unlike any other on the Nintendo Switch. While its turned-based battles and anime style might seem familiar, this Atlus crossover is subtly more complex that it appears. For that reason, we came up with a list of 10 beginner tips and tricks to help players navigate the game’s many leveling systems and menu options. Enjoy!

1. Level Up Explained

Unlike most role-playing games, Tokyo Mirage Sessions has multiple leveling systems that can be difficult to understand. While not as complex as other Atlus games, it is important to recognize the impacts of each leveling system. With each battle, players earn points that progress a character’s level, Carnage mastery, and stage rank.

• Character Level – This is likely the most familiar system for experienced RPG players. After completing a battle, party members earn experience points, which increase a character’s level. Each time part members levels up, a select number of base stats will increase.

• Carnage Mastery – Tokyo Mirage Sessions refers to weapons as Carnages. While each Carnage has a base attack stat, it also possesses a number of command, session, and passive skills that players can unlock by increasing a Carnage’s mastery. Characters earn Carnage points with each offensive battle action, and each Carnage can be leveled up five times.
  
• Stage Rank – Stage Rank is associated with Radiant skills and character side stories. Upon increasing a character’s stage rank, players are often given the choice to craft a new Radiant skill in the Bloom Palace. At certain stage ranks, character side stories also become available. Except for defensive postures and items, each action a character performs in battle adds to their respective stage rank. While it is unknown how many actions are required to increase a character’s stage rank, each character maxes out at a stage rank of 20. 

2. Level Grinding Made Easy

Similarly to the Persona and Shin Megami Tensei series, Tokyo Mirage Sessions is a “grindy” game. As a result, failure to level up consistently will result in challenging boss battles and frequent backtracking. Thankfully, the Fire Emblem crossover offers a way to level up quickly. When visiting the Training Area located within the Bloom Palace, players can discover four item drop locations, which produce a consumable item called a “Tome”. These items allow players to quickly increase a character’s level. If you are ever in a spot where you feel under leveled, visit the Training Area and grind for tomes.

3. Carnage Mastery

Because RPG veterans like to focus on attack stats, players can easily miss the benefit of mastering a Carnage. While more powerful Carnages have higher attack stats, mastering a weaker Carnage grants players additional skills. These skills can be active and passive abilities that far outweigh the benefits of increased attack stats. For this reason, we recommend maximizing a Carnage’s level before upgrading to a new weapon.

4. Increase Stage Rank Fast

While it might not seem important, stage rank is one of the most vital systems in Tokyo Mirage Sessions. Because access to side stories and Radiant skills require a certain stage rank, it is imperative that players focus on increasing each character’s stage rank. The problem is that the actions required to increase a character’s rank are vague. The only information we know is that players must perform a number of either Command actions or Session combos to increase a character’s stage rank. The best way to expedite this process is to use a character’s buff or debuff Command skills in battle. Simply travel to a previous chapter’s Idolasphere, enter a battle against a weak enemy, and spam the buff or debuff Command skills. Doing so will increase a character’s stage rank after a given number of turns.

5. Unities Explained

Tokyo Mirage Sessions‘ unity system is synonymous with crafting, and players can craft new weapons and abilities by speaking to Tiki in the Bloom Palace. The items needed to perform unities vary; however, most require items called “performas”. Enemies drop performas in battles, and players can find specific performa and enemy locations in the “Analysis” sub-menu.

• Carnage Unity – As previously stated, Carnages are the same as character weapons. Performing a Carnage unity requires a certain number of performas, which are enemy drops from battle. When a new Carnage is available, Tiki will send the player a message.

• Radiant Unity – Radiant skills become available after completing side stories or increasing stage rank. Unlike Carnage unity, completing a side story or achieving a stage rank normally rewards the player with the materials necessary to craft a Radiant skill. Tiki will send the player a message when a Radiant unity is available.

6. Skills Explained

Skills are by far the most complex system in Tokyo Mirage Sessions. In order to maximize your party’s efficiency and effectiveness, players must understand how to use each skill in battle.  

• Command – As with the character levels, Command skills are likely the most familiar. These skills are offensive actions used in battle, such as attacks, buffs, and debuffs. Characters learn Command skills by increasing Carnage mastery.

• Session – Players use these passive abilities to generate combo attacks in battle. Each session skill interacts with either a physical or elemental attack from another character resulting in an automatic combo attack. The only catch is that an enemy must be weak to the first character’s attack. For example, the “Fire-Slash” Session skill allows Itsuki to automatically perform a light sword attack whenever another party member uses a Fire Command skill against an enemy who is weak to fire. Like Command skills, characters learn Session skills by increasing Carnage mastery.

• Passive – These skills are passive stat buffs that players can earn by increasing Carnage mastery. Most skills either increase a base stat by two points or increase the hit rate percentage for a given Carnage. Characters can equip a maximum of six passive abilities.

• Radiant – Radiant Skills are character specific passive abilities that permanently increase a base stat or provide unique passive actions in battle. Players can unlock Radiant skills by increasing a character’s stage rank or completing a side story and forging the skill in the Bloom Palace.

• Extra – Extra skills are character-specific special attacks that unleash powerful effects on an entire group of enemies. Because extra skills require a certain amount of SP, players should focus on the special gauge found in the top-right corner of the battle screen. Characters learn new Extra skills by completing side stories.

7. Session Combos

Fans of Persona games will be familiar with the importance of exposing enemy weaknesses. However, unlike the Persona series, attacking enemy weaknesses in Tokyo Mirage Sessions does not stun your foe for an extra turn. Instead, attacking enemy weaknesses allows players to chain together combo attacks called Sessions. Party members must have Session skills that interact with each other in order to perform the Session combo.

In the example below, Itzuki attacks the enemy Casper’s electric weakness with the Command Skill Mazio. Because Touma possesses the Elec-Blaze Session skill, he will automatically attack with a fire skill after Itzuki’s Mazio attack. Finally, Tsubasa’s Fire-Lunge Session skill is also linked to Touma’s fire attack. After Touma attacks with the fire skill, Tsubasa will complete the combo by using a physical spear attack.

Because all three party members have Session skills that interact with one another, the entire three combo attack counts as only one turn in battle. For this reason, exposing enemy weaknesses and performing maximum Session combos is the heart of Tokyo Mirage Sessions‘ battle system.

8. Idolasphere Tips

At its core, Tokyo Mirage Sessions is a hardcore dungeon crawler that requires players to engage in countless battles. While RPG veterans are familiar with occasional level grinding, Atlus requires players to have a more consistent approach.

The Idolasphere is the dungeon crawling section of the game; therefore, we have three important tips when navigating these areas.

• Do Not Avoid Battles – It can be very tempting to forego enemy encounters later on in the game; however, this decision comes with dire consequences. Battles not only increase character levels, but they also unlock Carnage and stage rank abilities. In addition, enemies drop performa crafting items in battle, which are necessary to craft new Carnage weapons. As players explore the Idolasphere, do not forget to battle as often as possible.

• Rotate Party Members – In addition to battling enemies, rotating party member is also key when exploring the Idolasphere. While non-active party members still receive a portion of experience points after each battle, they will not receive Carnage or stage rank points. Be sure to rotate your characters in order to maintain a balanced party.

• Revisit Bloom Palace – The glaring annoyance in Tokyo Mirage Sessions is the amount of backtracking to the Bloom Palace. When characters reach a certain level or acquire enemy performas, Tiki will message the player that a new Carnage is available. Ignoring this information is fine so long as the party members’ Carnage is not mastered. However, once a Carnage has achieved mastery, the character will no longer receive Carnage points or skills. This will require players to leave the Idolasphere and travel back to the Bloom Palace to create a Carnage Unity with Tiki. Regardless of how tedious this might appear, returning to the Bloom Palace is vital to maximizing Carnage mastery.

9. Intermission Tasks

Unlike most RPGs, Tokyo Mirage Sessions gives players the chance to “take a break” after each of the main story chapters. These breaks are referred to as “intermissions” and provide the perfect opportunity to complete a few tasks.

• Side Stories – After Chapter 1, main party member side stories become available. We recommend using the intermission periods to complete side stories as these can unlock powerful Radiant skills. Players can check the availability of side stories on the laptop in the Fortuna office.

• Requests – Requests are shorter side quests offered by NPCs scattered throughout the world. Completing these quests rewards players with consumable items, which can be useful in battle. NPC requests also become available in previous Idolasphere dungeons so be sure to revisit during intermissions.

• Grind – If you struggled to defeat the main boss from the previous chapter, chances are your party members and Carnages were underleveled. Take the opportunity during the intermission to rebalance your party and grind in the Idolasphere opening located within the Bloom Palace.

10. Shopping Guide

While most RPGs encourage spending money in shops, Tokyo Mirage Sessions is a little different. Early on in the game, players will have access to a few shops scattered across Shibuya. While most shops contain consumable healing items and temporary buffs and debuffs, players can find these items in the Idolasphere. For this reason, we recommend spending your hard earned yen on accessories at Jewelry Carabia or full-party healing from vending machines. Because players can replace most healing items with command skills, we do not advise wasting hard earned money on Hee Ho Mart items.

Conclusion

There you have it: our list of beginner tips and tricks for Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE Encore. While the game is lesser know than most Atlus RPGs, it is unlike any other on the Nintendo Switch and is worth a playthrough.

If you enjoyed these beginner tips, be sure to check out our other guides for Astral Chain, Fire Emblem Three Houses, and others. Also, visit our homepage to subscribe to our newsletter and stay on top of all GamingROI content. Cheers!